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THE  SIGN  IMMANUEL 

/ 


Warfield  Library 


By  John  H.  Raven,  D.  D.,  Professor  of  Old  Testament  Languages  and 
Exegesis,  New  Brunswick  Theological  Seminary 


The  word  Immanuel  occurs  four  times  in  the  Bible 
(Isa.  7:14;  8:8;  8:10;  Matt.  1:23).  The  Hebrew  is 
the  same  in  the  three  Old  Testament  passages,  except 
that  some  Hebrew  texts  print  it  as  two  distinct  words. 
This  is  always  the  case  in  the  verses  in  the  eighth 
chapter,  but  not  so  uniformly  true  where  the  word 
occurs  in  Isaiah  7 :14. 

The  Septuagint  ancient  Greek  translation  trans¬ 
literates  it  as  a  proper  name  in  Isaiah  7:14  and 
translates  it  W&v  6  Oso?  in  Isaiah  8:8  and  8:10. 
The  original  Greek  of  Matthew  1:23  is  a  quotation 
of  Isaiah  7:14,  which  follows  the  Septuagint  exactly 
except  for  one  word.  Hence  it  makes  Immanuel  a 
proper  name,  spelling  it  Emmanuel  as  the  Septuagint 
does.  The  Vulgate,  or  Latin  version,  makes  it  a 
proper  name,  not  only  in  Isaiah  7 :14  and  Matthew 
1:23,  but  also  in  Isaiah  8:8.  Furthermore,  it  spells 
the  name  Emmanuel,  the  spelling  which  had  become 
familiar  to  the  readers  of  the  Greek  Bible.  The 
Targum  of  Jonathan,  the  ancient  translation  of  the 
books  of  the  prophets  into  Aramaic,  like  the  Vulgate, 
has  a  proper  name  in  Isaiah  7:14  and  8:8,  but  in 
Isaiah  8:10  it  translates  the  word,  or  rather  words: 
“God  is  our  help.”  Finally,  the  Peshitta,  or  transla¬ 
tion  of  the  whole  Bible  into  Syriac,  makes  our  word  a 
:  proper  name  in  all  four  places  where  it  occurs  not  only 
in  the  Old  Testament  but  in  the  New.  Both  the 
Authorized  and  the  Revised  Version  have  a  proper 

213 


) 


/ 


214  THE  BIBLICAL  REVIEW 

name  in  Isaiah  7:14  and  8:8  as  well  as  in  Matthew 
1:23,  but  they  both  translate  it:  “God  is  with  us” 
in  Isaiah  8:10.  The  spelling  of  the  name  in  the 
Authorized  Version  follows  the  Hebrew  in  the  three 
Old  Testament  passages  and  the  Septuagint  in  the 
quotation  in  Matthew  1:23. 

Of  the  four  verses  the  one  in  which  the  name  and 
its  associated  ideas  originated  is  Isaiah  7:14.  It  is 
therefore  appropriate  that  we  should  devote  most  of 
our  study  to  that  passage.  Our  consideration  of  it 
naturally  arranges  itself  under  three  heads :  The 
occasion  of  the  sign,  wherein  the  sign  consisted,  and 
the  fulfilment  of  the  sign. 

First,  then,  let  us  examine  the  occasion  of  the  sign. 
This  is  found  in  the  seventh  chapter  of  Isaiah,  as  that 
is  illuminated  by  contemporaneous  history.  In  Isaiah’s 
time  the  politics  of  Judah  were  influenced  by  the  two 
powerful  kingdoms  on  either  side,  Assyria  and  Egypt. 
Tiglath-pileser  III,  coming  to  the  throne  of  the  former 
country  in  745  b.c.,  revived  and  greatly  enlarged  the 
dominion  of  Assyria,  especially  in  the  region  about  the 
eastern  end  of  the  Mediterranean  Sea.  He  conquered 
Hamath,  which  had  been  friendly  to  Judah,  and  in 
738  b.c.  laid  Menahem  of  Samaria,  Rezin  of  Damascus, 
and  Hiram  of  Tyre  under  tribute.  Menahem  was 
succeeded  by  his  son  Pekahiah.  Two  years  later 
Pekah  assassinated  Pekahiah  and  seized  his  throne. 
Pekah  and  Rezin,  probably  inspired  or  encouraged  by 
Egypt,  attempted  to  form  a  confederacy  to  throw 
off  the  domination  of  Assyria.  Ahaz,  king  of  Judah, 
refused  to  join  with  them  because  he  considered 
Assyria  too  powerful.  He  was  also  probably  com¬ 
mitted  to  allegiance  to  Assyria.  On  account  of  this 
refusal  of  Ahaz,  Pekah  and  Rezin  sought  to  depose 


THE  SIGN  IMMANUEL 


215 


him  and  put  on  his  throne  a  man  named  “the  son  of 
Tabeel,”  who  would  do  their  bidding.  With  this  pur¬ 
pose  they  attacked  Jerusalem  but  did  not  succeed  in 
taking  it.  Elath,  however,  and  part  of  the  Negeb  fell 
into  their  hands  (2  Kings  16:5,  6). 

Under  these  circumstances  Ahaz  went  outside  of 
Jerusalem  to  inspect  the  water  supply,  to  see  whether 
the  city  could  hold  out  during  a  protracted  siege. 
Jehovah  commanded  the  young  prophet  Isaiah  to 
take  his  son,  Shear- jashub,  with  him  and  go  to  meet 
Ahaz.  This  son,  whose  name  meant  “a  remnant  shall 
return,”  was  a  living  prophecy  that,  although  the  exile 
was  certain,  the  nation  would  not  be  completely 
destroyed.  On  the  contrary,  the  faithful  remnant 
would  be  the  nucleus  o,f  a  new  and  better  Israel  after 
the  chastisement  of  the  exile.  The  presence  of  Shear- 
jashub  with  his  father  was  intended  to  encourage  the 
faith  of  Ahaz.  As  he  looked  upon  the  lad  he  should 
have  remembered  the  promises  of  Jehovah  through  his 
prophets,  that  Israel’s  future  contained  far  more 
glorious  things  than  its  past.  Isaiah’s  words  were  also 
reassuring.  He  compared  Rezin  and  Pekah  to  fire¬ 
brands  almost  extinguished  and  foretold  that  in  sixty- 
five  years  Ephraim  would  cease  to  be  a  nation.  This 
prediction  was  fulfilled  by  the  colonization  of  Samaria 
by  Esar-haddon,  king  of  Assyria  (2  Kings  17:24; 
Ezra  4:2) . 

As  proof  of  the  failure  of  the  confederacy  of  Rezin 
and  Pekah,  Jehovah  offered  Ahaz  any  sign  in  sheol 
or  in  Heaven.  The  literal  rendering  of  the  words  is: 
“Make  it  deep  to  sheol  or  make  it  high  upwards.” 
Although  Ahaz  was  given  absolute  freedom  of  choice 
and  could  have  selected  any  sign  whatever,  the  refer¬ 
ence  to  sheol  seems  to  suggest  some  sign  in  the  under- 


216  THE  BIBLICAL  REVIEW 

world,  such  as  the  resurrection  of  persons  from  the 
dead.  In  like  manner  the  reference  to  the  heights 
above  suggests  some  marvelous  appearance  in  the  sky, 
such  as  an  eclipse  or  a  conjunction  of  stars.  Thus 
the  suggestions  were  calculated  to  stimulate  the 
imagination  and  stir  the  faith  of  Ahaz  to  ask  the 
hardest  sign  he  could  devise.  Faithless  Ahaz,  however, 
did  not  respond  to  the  stimulus  which  God  gave  him, 
but  on  the  contrary  he  said:  “I  will  not  ask,  neither 
will  I  tempt  Jehovah.” 

The  hypocrisy  of  this  answer  is  evident.  It  need 
scarcely  be  remarked  that  it  would  not  be  tempting 
Jehovah  to  ask  a  sign  when  Jehovah  offered  one  and 
even  commanded  him  to  ask  for  one.  On  the  contrary, 
the  refusal  of  Ahaz  was  due  primarily  to  lack  of  faith 
in  God,  and  probably  in  particular  to  the  fact  that 
he  was  secretly  committed  to  Assyria.  Well  might 
Ahaz  tremble  at  the  confederacy  and  inspect  the  water 
supply  of  Jerusalem,  since  it  was  only  such  material 
and  political  things  that  he  could  see.  If  he  had 
examined  the  reservoirs  of  divine  power  with  half  the 
earnestness  with  which  he  examined  the  upper  pool  in 
the  highway  of  the  fuller’s  field,  he  would  have  honored 
God  by  making  a  large  draft  upon  them.  If  he  had 
thought  of  the  armies  of  Heaven  instead  of  the  armies 
of  Assyria,  Ephraim,  and  Syria,  he  would  have 
trembled  to  oppose  God  more  than  to  oppose  the 
western  confederacy.  Disgusted  with  the  faithlessness 
of  Ahaz,  the  prophet  turns  away  from  him  and 
addresses  the  house  of  David,  that  is,  the  entire  royal 
family,  as  if  in  the  hope  that  among  them  one  man 
of  faith  could  be  found.  He  says:  “Is  it  a  small 
thing  for  you  to  weary  men,  that  ye  will  weary  my 
God  also?”  Both  pronouns  are  plural,  showing  that 


THE  SIGN  IMMANUEL 


217 


the  reproof  was  meant  not  for  Ahaz  only  but  for  the 
entire  family.  Not  satisfied  with  wearying  Isaiah  by 
their  faithlessness,  they  even  had  the  audacity  to  weary 
God  by  refusing  to  ask  for  a  sign  when  He  offered  it. 
Then  Isaiah,  by  divine  inspiration,  spoke  the  memor¬ 
able  words:  “Therefore  the  Lord  himself  will  give 
you  a  sign,  behold,  a  virgin  shall  conceive,  and  bear 
a  son,  and  shall  call  his  name  Immanuel.” 

Our  second  inquiry  relates  to  the  sign  itself. 
Wherein  did  it  consist?  There  are  three  elements  in 
the  statement  concerning  the  sign  which  God  gave: 
1.  The  mother  of  the  child,  2,  the  name  of  the  child, 
and  3,  the  history  of  the  child  as  given  in  verses  15-17. 
The  sign  might  conceivably  consist  in  any  one  of 
these  or  in  any  two  of  them  or  in  them  all  together 
or  in  the  relation  of  these  elements  to  one  another. 
Let  us  take  up  these  elements  separately. 

1.  Does  the  sign  consist  in  the  mother?  Following 
Matthew  1 :23,  the  majority  of  exegetes  in  the  Christian 
church  have  regarded  this  passage  as  a  definite  pre¬ 
diction  of  the  virgin  birth  of  our  Lord  Jesus  Christ. 
The  tendency  of  this  exegesis  is  to  fix  the  attention  on 
the  mother  rather  than  on  the  child.  Is  such  an 
emphasis  justified? 

Let  us  understand  clearly  at  the  outset  that  the 
question  we  are  considering  is  not  whether  Jesus  was 
born  of  a  virgin,  as  stated  by  Matthew  and  Luke,  but 
whether  his  virgin  birth  was  foretold  by  Isaiah.  What¬ 
ever  conclusion  we  shall  reach  on  the  latter  question, 
the  writer  expresses  his  unwavering  faith  in  the  virgin 
birth  of  our  Saviour. 

The  first  necessity  is  an  examination  of  the  exact 
meaning  and  usage  of  the  word  rendered  “virgin”  in 
the  verse  before  us.  This  word  is  found  only  seven 


218  THE  BIBLICAL  REVIEW 

i 

times  in  the  Old  Testament  (Gen.  24:43;  Ex.  2:8; 
Ps.  68:25;  Prov.  30:19;  Song  of  Sol.  1:3;  6:8;  Isa. 
7:14).  Although  not  one  of  these  verses  refers  to  a 
married  woman,  it  must  be  admitted  that  not  one  of 
them  is  decisive  that  the  word  necessarily  means  a 
virgin.  Rebekah,  to  whom  Genesis  24:43  refers,  was 
indeed  a  virgin  at  the  time  to  which  that  chapter 
refers,  but  we  know  that  she  was  such  not  by  verse 
43  but  by  verse  16,  where  a  different  Hebrew  word 
occurs.  Moses’  sister  was  undoubtedly  a  virgin  when 
she  went  to  call  his  mother  to  nurse  the  infant  Moses, 
but  that  fact  does  not  prove  that  the  word  by  which 
she  is  named  in  Exodus  2:8  connotes  virginity.  The 
same  remarks  apply  to  the  young  women  spoken  of 
in  Psalms  68 :25  and  Song  of  Solomon  1 :3.  On  the 
other  hand,  the  reference  in  Proverbs  30:19  to  “the 
way  of  a  man  with  a  maiden,”  as  one  of  the  four 
mysterious  things,  seems  to  be  to  carnal  intercourse, 
which  was  mysterious  in  its  results.  Of  course,  it 
might  refer  to  the  first  instance  of  such  intercourse, 
but  this  is  very  improbable,  since  the  way  of  a  man  with 
a  young  woman  on  the  first  occasion  is  scarcely  more 
mysterious  than  on  later  occasions.  The  carnal  refer¬ 
ence  is  apparently  confirmed  by  the  next  verse,  which 
speaks  of  an  adulterous  woman.  It  is  also  confirmed 
by  Psalm  139:13-16  and  Ecclesiastes  11:5,  which 
speak  of  the  child  in  the  womb  and  its  growth  as  a 
great  mystery.  The  Song  of  Solomon  6:8  may  refer 
to  virgins,  but  the  context  is  rather  against  that 
reference.  There  Solomon  tells  Shulamite  concerning 
his  court:  “There  are  threescore  queens,  and  four¬ 
score  concubines,  and  young  women  without  number.” 

To  sum  up  the  evidence  from  the  usus  loquendi  of 
the  word  rendered  “virgin”  in  Isaiah  7:14,  even  if 


THE  SIGN  IMMANUEL 


219 


Proverbs  30:19  and  Song  of  Solomon  6:8  may  be 
understood  as  references  to  virgins,  it  cannot  be 
affirmed  that  the  context  is  decisive  for  such  reference 
either  there  or  in  the  other  passages.  In  all  the 
passages  the  context  would  be  satisfied  by  translating 
the  word  young  woman.  This  conclusion  is  con¬ 
firmed  by  the  same  word  as  found  in  the  cognate 
languages.  In  the  Arabic  the  verb  of  this  stem  means 
to  be  lustful,  and  the  masculine  noun  denotes  a  young 
man.  In  Aramaic  the  feminine  noun  merely  desig¬ 
nates  a  young  woman.  This  is  especially  evident  in 
the  Targum,  for  in  Judges  19  it  uses  this  word  of  the 
concubine  of  the  Levite  who  was  unfaithful  to  him. 
In  the  Palmyrene  dialect  of  Aramaic  the  word  is  used 
of  harlots.  Thus  it  evidently  refers  to  a  young  woman 
of  marriageable  age  but  does  not  necessarily  denote 
a  virgin. 

The  line  of  argument  we  are  following  becomes 
even  stronger  when  we  consider  the  usage  of  the 
common  word  for  virgin  in  the  Old  Testament.  This 
word  occurs  there  no  less  than  sixty  times  if  we 
include  the  ten  places  where  its  derivative,  rendered 
“virginity,”  is  found.  In  several  of  these  places  the 
context  necessitates  the  idea  of  virginity.  So,  for 
example,  in  Genesis  24:16  we  read  of  Rebekah:  “The 
damsel  was  very  fair  to  look  upon,  a  virgin,  neither 
had  any  man  known  her.”  In  Deuteronomy  22:14,  15 
this  stem  is  used  in  designating  the  tokens  of  virginity. 
Again  this  is  the  word  in  Judges  11:37,  38,  where  the 
daughter  of  Jephthah  speaks  of  bewailing  her  virginity. 
Such  passages  are  meaningless  unless  the  word  con¬ 
notes  virginity.  It  is  unnecessary  to  examine  all  the 
verses  where  this  word  occurs;  for  if  it  necessarily 
means  a  virgin  in  one  passage  the  case  is  proven.  The 


220 


THE  BIBLICAL  REVIEW 


special  point  is  that,  while  Isaiah  uses  the  common 
word  five  times  (Isa.  23:4,  12;  37:22;  47:1;  62:5)  he 
uses  the  uncommon  and  indecisive  word  only  in  Isaiah 
7 :14.  It  is  inconceivable  that,  if  Isaiah  had  meant  the 
sign  to  consist  in  the  virginity  of  the  mother,  he  would 
have  passed  by  the  common  designation  for  this  idea 
and  used  a  word  found  nowhere  else  in  his  writings 
and  which  does  not  necessarily  convey  this  idea.  The 
Septuagint  translates  rcapOsvot;  in  Isaiah  7 :14,  but  there 
is  only  one  other  passage  where  the  word  is  rendered 
by  this  usual  Greek  word  for  virgin  (Gen.  24:43). 
The  Greek  versions  of  Aquila,  Theodotion,  and 
Symmachus,  which  were  made  in  the  second  century 
of  our  era  because  the  text  of  the  Septuagint  had 
become  almost  hopelessly  corrupt,  improved  the  trans¬ 
lation  at  this  point  by  the  reading  veavcg,  meaning  a 
young  woman  or  girl,  the  very  same  word  by  which 
the  Septuagint  translates  it  in  Exodus  2:8;  Psahns 
68 :2 5 ;  Song  of  Solomon  1 :3 ;  6 :8. 

The  question  of  the  virgin  birth  of  Christ  is  a 
New  Testament  and  not  an  Old  Testament  question. 
Of  course,  if  there  were  a  prediction  in  the  Hebrew 
Scriptures,  which  by  a  fair  grammatico-historical 
exegesis  could  be  regarded  as  pointing  to  the  virgin 
birth  of  the  Messiah,  we  would  be  justified  in  using 
it  in  proof  of  such  a  birth.  But  we  are  not  justified 
in  reading  into  the  Old  Testament  a  meaning  which 
is  not  there.  Since  there  is  no  prediction  of  the 
virgin  birth  of  Christ  in  the  Old  Testament,  it  is  abso¬ 
lutely  neutral  on  the  subject.  It  cannot  be  used  prop¬ 
erly  in  defense  of  the  virgin  birth  nor  can  its  silence 
be  fairly  used  as  an  argument  against  it. 

The  virgin  birth  of  our  Lord  is  one  of  many 
matters  in  connection  with  the  incarnation  which  were 


THE  SIGN  IMMANUEL  221 

not  foretold  in  the  older  Scriptures.  The  coming  of 
the  Magi,  the  baptism  in  the  Jordan,  the  temptation 
in  the  wilderness,  the  transfiguration,  and  many  other 
incidents  of  His  wonderful  life  were  not  foretold  in 
a  direct  sense.  Indeed,  while  many  specific  things 
were  foretold,  such  as  the  birth  in  Bethlehem,  the 
rejection,  the  sale  for  thirty  pieces  of  silver,  the 
piercing,  that  his  bones  should  not  be  broken,  etc.,  the 
bulk  of  the  Messianic  predictions  point,  not  to  details 
of  His  life,  but  to  the  broad  and  general  outlines  of 
His  mission  and  work.  The  Messianic  predictions  of 
the  Old  Testament  do  not  give  us  a  life  of  the  Messiah 
beforehand.  Hence  the  absence  of  a  prediction  of  any 
event  in  Christ’s  life  could  be  used  as  an  argument 
against  the  historicity  of  that  event  only  if  there  were 
any  prediction  of  the  Old  Testament  with  which  it 
was  in  conflict.  This  is  not  the  case  with  the  virgin 
birth.  Although  it  was  not  foretold,  we  who  live  after 
the  event  can  see  how  admirably  it  agrees  with  the 
conception  of  His  person  presented  in  those  predictions 
which  relate  to  His  exalted  nature  and  power.  This 
is  particularly  the  case  with  the  names  applied  to 
Him  in  Isaiah  9:6,  a  passage  whose  close  relation  to 
the  one  before  us  has  long  been  realized.  It  should 
not  surprise  us  that  the  child  whose  name  shall  be 
called  “Wonderful,  Counsellor,  Mighty  God,  Ever¬ 
lasting  Father,  Prince  of  Peace,”  was  born  of  a  virgin. 
Although  we  could  not  have  foretold  such  a  birth  from 
these  names,  it  agrees  exactly  with  them.  We  can 
even  say  that  such  a  character  requires  something 
exceptional  in  His  birth,  a  very  special  relation  to  God. 
Human  ancestry  on  both  sides,  with  a  merely  human 
inheritance,  would  seem  to  conflict  with  His  divine 
origin.  This  general  argument  for  the  virgin  birth 


222 


THE  BIBLICAL  REVIEW 


from  the  broad  lines  of  Messianic  prediction  is  in 
reality  far  stronger  than  one  derived  from  a  single 
Old  Testament  passage. 

It  is  contended,  however,  by  some  that  the  quota¬ 
tion  in  Matthew  regards  the  words  of  Isaiah  7 :14  as  a 
prediction  of  the  virgin  birth.  This  view  seems  to  the 
writer  altogether  mistaken.  After  narrating  that 
Mary  “was  found  with  child  of  the  Holy  Spirit,”  the 
announcement  of  this  to  Joseph,  and  the  command  of 
the  angel  to  name  the  child  Jesus,  the  Evangelist  says: 
“Now  all  this  is  come  to  pass,  that  it  might  be  fulfilled 
which  was  spoken  by  the  Lord  through  the  prophet, 
saying,  Behold,  the  virgin  shall  be  with  child,  and 
shall  bring  forth  a  son,  And  they  shall  call  his  name 
Immanuel;  which  is,  being  interpreted,  God  with  us.” 
The  point  of  the  fulfilment  as  of  the  prediction  was 
not  in  the  mother  but  in  the  child.  Matthew  did  not 
regard  Isaiah  7:14  as  a  prediction  of  the  virgin  birth 
but  of  the  birth.  This  seems  to  be  reflected  in  the 
formula,  of  introduction:  All  this  is  come  to  pass, 
that  it  might  be  fulfilled,  etc.  All  things  in  connection 
with  the  birth  of  Christ  were  in  a  general  way  a 
fulfilment  of  the  prophecy  of  Isaiah,  but  not  all  the 
details  were  found  in  the  prediction. 

Even  if  the  word  ^apOevo?,  by  which  the  Septuagint 
renders  the  Hebrew,  were  correct,  and  that  word  were 
found  in  Matthew  in  its  earliest  form,  which  is  some¬ 
what  uncertain,  the  conception  of  a  virgin  birth  would 
not  have  been  made  upon  the  mind  of  Matthew  or 
any  other  reader  of  the  Old  Testament  in  Matthew’s 
day.  Almost  exactly  the  words  of  Isaiah  7:14  were 
spoken  by  the  angel  of  Jehovah  to  Hagar:  “Behold, 
thou  art  with  child,  and  shalt  bear  a  son;  and  thou 
shalt  call  his  name  Ishmael”  (Gen.  16:11).  No  one 


THE  SIGN  IMMANUEL 


223 


infers  from  this  that  the  birth  of  Ishmael  was  a  virgin 
birth.  If  such  an  announcement  had  been  made  to  a 
virgin,  she  would  have  thought  it  referred  to  the  first 
child  of  her  marriage,  for  the  Hebrew  may  mean  either, 
thou  art  with  child,  or  thou  shalt  be  with  child.  In 
Hebrew  the  very  same  word  is  found  in  both  places. 
The  first  birth  of  every  marriage  is  in  this  sense  a 
virgin  birth.  If  Isaiah  had  meant  to  convey  the  idea 
that  the  mother  of  Immanuel  would  bear  a  child  with¬ 
out  intercourse  with  man  and  thus  remain  a  virgin 
after  the  birth  of  Immanuel,  it  would  have  been 
necessary  for  him  not  only  to  use  the  word  which 
always  denotes  a  virgin  but  also  to  use  a  circumlocu¬ 
tion.  This  idea  was  so  totally  new  to  Jewish  thought 
that  the  use  of  the  word  virgin  alone  would  not  suffice 
to  express  it.  There  had  been  remarkable  births  and 
that,  too,  in  the  Messianic  line ;  but  a  virgin  birth  is  not 
mentioned  in  the  Old  Testament. 

Such  accompanying  words  are  found  in  the  account 
in  Matthew.  It  is  because  of  them,  and  not  because 
of  the  quotation  from  Isaiah,  that  we  believe  in  the 
virgin  birth  of  Christ.  This  is  another  instance  of 
a  phenomenon  familiar  to  all  careful  students  of 
Scripture,  that  the  fulfilment  always  contains  more 
than  the  prediction.  The  very  notion  of  fulfilment 
suggests  this.  The  fulfilments  of  Scripture  pour  a 
new  meaning  into  its  predictions,  a  meaning  indeed 
which  was  always  there,  but  which  was  so  hidden  that 
the  hearers  of  the  prediction  could  not  discern  it 
perfectly.  Thus  it  is  only  in  the  light  of  the  fulfilment 
that  we  can  see  the  full  significance  of  the  predictions. 
In  the  case  before  us,  possibly  we  may  be  justified  in 
looking  back  at  the  passage  in  Isaiah  and  surmising 
that  the  guiding  Spirit  led  the  prophet  to  pass  by  the 


224 


THE  BIBLICAL  REVIEW 


usual  word  for  virgin,  which  he  used  five  times  else¬ 
where,  and  employ  a  word  found  nowhere  else  in  his 
writings,  as  though  to  hint  that  the  young  woman 
referred  to  would  be  unique  among  women.  As  to 
the  way  in  which  she  would  be  unique  the  prophet 
leaves  us  in  the  dark. 

2.  Next  we  examine  the  second  element  in  which  the 
sign  might  conceivably  consist,  that  is  the  name  of  the 
child.  In  mentioning  it  we  should  not  exclude  the 
character  of  the  child  in  so  far  as  it  is  suggested  by 
the  name.  If  a  mother  should  name  her  child 
Immanuel  this  in  itself  would  scarcely  satisfy  the 
prediction,  unless  the  child  partook  of  the  character 
suggested  by  the  name.  In  fact,  in  the  Bible  to  call 
a  person  by  a  given  name  almost  invariably  means 
that  the  person  shall  have  the  qualities  or  history 
which  the  name  suggests.  Such  was  the  case  in  the 
names  of  Abel,  Cain,  Seth,  Noah,  Shem,  Abraham, 
Isaac,  Jacob,  Israel,  Judah,  Moses,  Ichabod,  Nabal, 
etc.  So  true  was  this  to  the  Hebrew  conception  of 
names  that  sometimes  the  expression,  to  call  by  a 
certain  name,  occurs  where  the  meaning  is  not  that 
the  name  mentioned  shall  be  the  usual  designation  of 
the  person  or  even  that  he  shall  ever  be  addressed  by 
it,  but  merely  that  he  shall  exemplify  the  idea  of  the 
name.  One  of  the  many  examples  of  this  is  the  list 
of  names  of  the  Messiah  in  Isaiah  9:6.  The  idea  was 
not  that  anyone  would  address  the  Messiah  as  Won¬ 
derful,  Counsellor,  Mighty  God,  Everlasting  Father 
or  Prince  of  Peace,  but  that  these  names  were  a 
delineation  of  His  person  and  character.  The  same 
is  true  of  the  name  Immanuel.  That  it  was  understood 
in  this  way  by  the  Jews  in  the  time  of  our  Lord  is 
evidenced  by  the  fact  that  Matthew  narrates  the  com- 


THE  SIGN  IMMANUEL 


225 


mand  of  the  angel  to  call  the  child’s  name  Jesus  and 
then  affirms:  “Now  all  this  is  come  to  pass,  that  it 
might  be  fulfilled  which  was  spoken  by  the  Lord 
through  the  prophet,  saying,  Behold,  the  virgin  shall 
be  with  child,  and  shall  bring  forth  a  son,  And  they 
shall  call  his  name  Immanuel.”  It  is  passing  strange 
that  He  should  be  called  Jesus  in  order  to  fulfil  a 
prediction  that  He  should  be  called  Immanuel.  The 
strangeness  disappears  when  we  know  the  usage  of 
the  expression,  to  call  His  name. 

What  is  the  meaning  of  the  name  Immanuel?  The 
Evangelist  adds  his  interpretation  to  the  name:  “God 
with  us.”  On  the  basis  of  their  understanding  of 
these  words  many  exegetes  have  concluded  that  the 
name  implies  the  essential  Deity  of  the  child,  that  the 
child  is  none  other  than  God  Himself  manifest  in 
the  flesh.  Here  is  another  point  in  which  the  fulfilment 
surpasses  the  prediction.  Jesus  Christ  was  indeed  God 
manifest  in  the  flesh,  but  our  firm  belief  in  this  fact 
should  not  influence  our  exegesis  of  this  name.  It 
should  be  interpreted  in  the  light  of  other  names  of 
similar  formation.  The  name  was  a  sentence:  “God 
is  with  us,”  like  the  names  of  the  two  children  of 
Isaiah,  Shear- jashub  and  Maher-shalal-hash-baz.  The 
former  name  means:  “A  remnant  shall  return,”  and 
the  latter:  “Hasten  the  spoil,  hurry  the  booty.”  Even 
the  beginner  in  the  study  of  Hebrew  knows  that  the 
verb  to  be  is  commonly  not  expressed  in  the  sentence. 
Thus  a  close  parallel  to  the  name  Immanuel  in  its 
formation  is  Hephzibah  which  means:  “My  delight  is 
in  her.”  It  is  well  known  that  many  Bible  names 
contain  one  of  the  names  of  God.  Those  ending  in 
jah  and  ah  are  compounded  with  the  name  Jehovah 
in  its  shorter  form  Jah ,  which  occurs  in  Exodus  15:2; 


326 


THE  BIBLICAL  REVIEW 


17:16;  Psalms  68:4,  and  often  in  the  word  hallelujah. 
Thus  Isaiah  means  “Jehovah  hath  saved”;  Jeremiah, 
“Jehovah  doth  establish”;  Zephaniah,  “Jehovah  hath 
hidden”;  Zechariah,  “Jehovah  hath  remembered,”  etc. 
Many  other  names  ending  in  el  contain  the  name  of 
God,  which  occurs  separately  about  two  hundred  and 
fifty  times  in  the  Old  Testament,  beginning  with 
Genesis  14:18.  Thus  Ezekiel  means  “God  is  strong”; 
Daniel,  “God  is  my  judge”;  Joel,  “Jehovah  is  God,” 
etc.  The  possession  of  one  of  these  names  did  not  by 
any  means  imply  that  the  man  was  in  any  sense  an 
incarnation  of  God.  The  verb  to  be  is  omitted  in 
every  one  of  them.  Yet  we  would  not  be  justified 
in  rendering  Daniel,  God  my  judge,  and  inferring 
that  he  was  an  incarnation  of  God,  the  judge  of  men, 
or  in  rendering  Joel,  Jehovah  God,  and  concluding 
that  the  prophet  whose  name  included  two  names  of 
God  must  have  been  an  incarnation  of  Deity.  In  like 
manner  we  are  not  justified  in  rendering  the  name 
Immanuel,  “God  with,  us,”  if  by  that  rendering  we 
express  our  belief  that  the  name  implies  Deity.  If, 
however,  we  render  the  name,  “God  with  us,”  implying 
that  the  child  was  a  special  token  of  the  presence  of 
God  with  His  people,  we  are  in  line  with  similarly 
formed  names,  such  as  Daniel,  Joel,  etc.  This  is 
probably  the  sense  in  which  Matthew  interpreted  the 
name. 

The  name,  then,  requires  that  its  owner  should  be 
a  special  proof  of  the  presence  of  God  with  His  people. 
Whether  this  proof  was  an  incarnation  or  only  a 
special  answer  to  prayer,  like  Samuel,  or  the  fulfil¬ 
ment  of  a  divine  promise,  like  Isaac  and  Samson,  the 
name  itself  does  not  decide.  Isaac,  Ishmael,  Jacob, 
Esau,  Samson  or  Samuel  might  have  been  named 


THE  SIGN  IMMANUEL 


m 


Immanuel  because  each  one  of  them  was  a  special 
manifestation  of  the  presence  of  God;  but  the  posses¬ 
sion  of  the  name  would  not  have  suggested  Deity. 
Yet  the  name  has  a  special  significance  when  applied 
to  our  Lord.  Although  it  does  not  necessitate  the 
idea  of  Deity,  it  is  very  appropriate  to  the  incar¬ 
nate  Son  of  God.  He  was  a  proof  of  the  presence 
of  God  with  His  people  superior  to  all  other 
proofs.  If  ever  we  doubt  that  God  is  with  us,  we 
have  only  to  think  of  Him  and  our  doubts  should 
be  dispelled. 

In  this  connection  it  is  fitting  to  speak  of  the  exact 
meaning  of  the  parts  of  the  name.  There  are  two 
prepositions  in  Hebrew  meaning  with,  as  there  are  in 
Greek.  Furthermore,  they  correspond  quite  nearly 
in  meaning.  One  of  them  resembles  and  does  not 
denote  any  very  special  intimacy  of  relation.  The 
other,  like  the  Greek  wv,  implies  fellowship  or  com¬ 
panionship.  There  are  indeed  some  exceptions  to  this 
explanation  of  these  synonyms,  but  in  general  this  is 
the  point  of  comparison.  The  preposition  in  the  name 
Immanuel  is  the  latter  one,  suggesting  intimacy.  The 
name  for  God  in  Immanuel  is  not  the  most  common 
one,  but  is  found  about  two  hundred  and  fifty  times, 
while  the  other  is  found  over  five  thousand  times.  It 
emphasizes  the  power  of  God  and  might  be  rendered 
the  Almighty.  Thus  Immanuel  may  be  translated: 
The  Almighty  is  in  fellowship  with  us.  As  applied 
to  Jesus  Christ,  it  suggests  His  real  humanity,  that 
He  took  on  Himself  our  nature,  suffered  in  all  points 
as  we  suffer — was  one  with  us.  It  is  not  that  all  this 
could  be  inferred  from  the  name  by  the  Old  Testa¬ 
ment  saint,  but  that,  in  the  light  of  the  fulfilment,  we 
can  see  how  all  this  is  hidden  in  the  name. 


229 


THE  BIBLICAL  REVIEW 


Some  commentators  object  to  finding  the  sign  in 
Immanuel  on  the  ground  that  the  sign  had  to  be  a 
miracle.  On  the  same  ground  they  argue  in  favor  of 
the  virgin  birth  as  the  real  essence  of  the  sign.  A 
study  of  the  word  sign  as  used  in  the  Old  Testament, 
and  indeed  in  the  New  Testament,  shows  that  the  sign 
was  not  necessarily  a  miracle.  The  same  Hebrew 
word  was  used  of  the  rainbow  which  God  took  as  a 
sign,  or  token,  of  the  covenant  He  made  with  Noah 
and  his  descendants  (Gen.  9:12,  13,  17).  Circumcision 
was  called  by  this  name  (Gen.  17:11).  The  Sabbath 
was  a  sign  (Ex.  31:13).  On  the  other  hand,  the 
miracles  of  Moses  in  Egypt  were  signs  (Ex.  7:3; 
8:23).  Anything  was  a  sign  which  was  chosen  to 
remind  men  of  a  covenant  or  promise.  Hence  there 
is  nothing  necessarily  miraculous  in  it.  The  reason 
the  sign  was  so  often  a  miracle  was  because  a  miracle 
was  calculated  to  fix  the  attention  of  men  and  keep 
before  their  minds  the  promise  or  covenant  confirmed. 
Any  unusual  thing  or  event,  however,  would  serve  this 
purpose.  Thus  this  criterion  alone  cannot  decide  for 
us  whether  the  sign  was  the  virginity  of  the  mother, 
or  the  child  Himself.  Both  were  equally  remarkable 
and,  indeed,  in  the  proper  sense,  both  were  miraculous. 
Surely  Christ  Himself  was  as  great  a  miracle  as  the 
virgin  birth. 

The  reason  we  regard  the  sign  as  consisting  in  the 
child  is  the  fact  that  He  was  mentioned  as  a  sign 
later,  while  such  was  not  the  case  with  the  mother,  at 
least  as  a  virgin.  In  Isaiah  8:8,  where  the  prophet 
speaks  of  the  impending  invasion  of  Assyria,  he  says: 
“The  stretching  out  of  its  wings  shall  fill  the  breadth 
of  thy  land,  O  Immanuel.”  The  use  of  this  name 
would  remind  his  hearers  of  the  former  prophecy.  The 


THE  SIGN  IMMANUEL 


229 


matter  in  that  prophecy  which  he  wished  to  keep  in 
their  minds  was  not  the  virginity  of  the  mother,  but 
it  was  the  child.  Even  stronger  is  the  case  in  Isaiah 
8:10:  “Take  counsel  together,  and  it  shall  be  brought 
to  nought;  speak  the  word,  and  it  shall  not  stand: 
for  Immanuel.”  It  is  almost  as  if  the  prophet  pointed 
to  Immanuel  as  evidence  that  their  counsel  would  be 
brought  to  nought.  There  surely  it  is  not  the  mother 
who  is  the  sign,  but  the  son.  For  the  time  the  mother 
seems  to  be  forgotten,  and  the  son  is  uppermost  in  the 
mind  of  the  prophet.  Would  this  be  the  case  if  the 
main  point  of  the  prophecy  were  the  mother?  There 
is  one  veiled  reference  to  the  mother  in  the  prophecy 
of  Isaiah’s  contemporary,  Micah.  In  connection  with 
the  memorable  prediction  of  the  birth  of  the  Messiah 
he  uses  these  somewhat  enigmatic  words:  “Therefore 
will  he  give  them  up,  until  the  time  that  she  who 
travaileth  hath  brought  forth:  then  the  residue  of  his 
brethren  shall  return  unto  the  children  of  Israel” 
(Mic.  5:8).  The  reference  is  to  the  same  mother 
mentioned  in  Isaiah  7 :14,  but  it  is  noteworthy  that 
there  is  not  the  slightest  hint  of  her  virginity.  She 
is  simply  designated  as  the  one  who  travaileth,  a 
description  which  would  be  appropriate  to  any  mother 
about  to  bring  forth  a  child. 

3.  The  third  element  in  the  prediction  is  the  history 
of  the  child  as  told  in  Isaiah  7 :15-17.  Before  inquiring 
whether  this  is  a  part  of  the  sign,  it  is  necessary  to 
interpret  a  few  matters  in  these  verses.  The  Revised 
Version  reads:  “Butter  and  honey  shall  he  eat,  when 
he  knoweth  to  refuse  the  evil,  and  choose  the  good.  For 
before  the  child  shall  know  to  refpse  the  evil,  and  choose 
the  good,  the  land  whose  two  kings  thou  abhorrest  shall 
be  forsaken.  Jehovah  will  bring  upon  thee,  and  upon 


230 


THE  BIBLICAL  REVIEW 


thy  people,  and  upon  thy  father’s  house,  days  that  have 
not  come,  from  the  day  that  Ephraim  departed  from 
Judah — even  the  king  of  Assyria.” 

The  translation  of  verse  15  is  better  in  the  Author¬ 
ized  Version.  It  is  “that  he  may  know,”  instead  of 
“when  he  knoweth.”  The  form  in  Hebrew  is  the 
infinitive  with  the  preposition  to,  which  is  the  regular 
way  to  express  purpose.  It  is  singularly  naive  to 
remark,  as  some  commentators  do,  that  eating  butter 
and  honey  does  not  teach  a  child  to  refuse  evil  and 
choose  good.  Of  course  it  does  not,  if  the  butter  and 
honey  were  chosen  from  all  other  kinds  of  food. 
Butter  and  honey  were  not  like  the  fruit  of  the  tree 
of  the  knowledge  of  good  and  evil  of  which  the  serpent 
said  to  Eve:  “In  the  day  ye  eat  thereof,  then  your 
eyes  shall  be  opened,  and  ye  shall  be  as  gods,  knowing 
good  and  evil”  (Gen.  3:5).  Eating  butter  and  honey 
is  here  indicative  of  the  reduction  of  the  land  to  a 
state  of  pastoral  simplicity.  This  becomes  evident  by 
a  comparison  with  Isaiah  7:21,  22,  where  we  read  that 
as  a  result  of  the  Assyrian  invasion:  “It  shall  come 
to  pass  in  that  day,  that  a  man  shall  keep  alive  a  young 
cow,  and  two  sheep;  and  it  shall  come  to  pass,  that 
because  of  the  abundance  of  milk  that  they  shall  give 
he  shall  eat  butter:  for  butter  and  honey  shall  every 
one  eat  that  is  left  in  the  midst  of  the  land.” 
Immanuel  is  to  be  brought  up  not  in  the  lap  of  luxury 
but  in  the  midst  of  hardship  and  privation.  These 
hardships  will  be  a  means  of  grace  to  him  so  that,  as 
so  often  happens,  he  will  develop  character.  Such 
was  the  case  with  Christ  who  “learned  obedience  by 
the  things  which  he  suffered”  (Heb.  5:8). 

The  reference  in  Isaiah  7:16,  to  “the  land  whose 
two  kings  thou  abhorrest,”  is  to  verse  2,  where  the 


THE  SIGN  IMMANUEL 


231 


fear  of  Ahaz  for  the  kings  of  Syria  and  Ephraim  is 
mentioned.  The  inhabitants  of  those  countries  are  to 
be  carried  into  exile  before  Immanuel  comes  to  years 
of  discretion.  Verse  17  makes  plain  how  this  is  to 
be  accomplished  by  the  terrible  Assyrian  invasion,  not 
only  of  Syria  and  Ephraim,  but  of  Judah  as  well. 
The  reference  is  not  to  the  deportation  of  Judah, 
which  did  not  occur  until  586  b.c.,  but  to  the  invasion 
of  Sennacherib  in  701  b.c.,  when  Judah  would  have 
fallen  but  for  the  special  interposition  of  God. 

Now,  there  seems  to  be  a  conflict  between  the 
name  of  Immanuel  and  his  history.  The  name  as 
usually  understood  contains  a  promise  of  blessing, 
but  his  history  refers  to  a  condition  of  hardship  and 
political  doom.  How  can  we  reconcile  this  conflict? 
This  reconciliation  comes  from  a  consideration  of  the 
relation  of  the  sign  actually  given  with  the  sign 
offered  to  Ahaz.  As  we  have  seen,  Ahaz  was  origi¬ 
nally  given  the  privilege  of  choosing  any  sign  what¬ 
ever  that  the  confederacy  of  Syria  and  Samaria  would 
not  succeed  and  that  the  lands  of  Ephraim  would  cease 
to  be  a  people.  We  have  also  seen  that  when  Ahaz 
refused  to  ask  such  a  sign  Isaiah  turned  away  from 
him  and  addressed  the  whole  house  of  David,  reproving 
them  for  their  lack  of  faith  and  announcing  the  sign 
which  we  are  studying.  We  must  not  expect  that 
the  sign  actually  given,  therefore,  was  intended  to 
confirm  the  same  prediction  as  that  which  had  been 
spoken  to  Ahaz.  Here  is  another  illustration  of  the 
truth  that  God  does  for  us  far  more  abundantly  than 
we  can  ask  or  think.  Ahaz  was  offered  a  sign  that 
the  confederacy  of  Syria  and  Ephraim  would  not 
stand,  but  God  gave  to  the  house  of  David  something 
far  greater  than  this.  The  failure  of  the  confederacy. 


232 


THE  BIBLICAL  REVIEW 


like  the  failure  of  anything  else  that  was  directed 
against  the  Kingdom  of  Judah,  was  related  in  the 
last  analysis  to  the  Messianic  promise.  If  the  con¬ 
federacy  succeeded,  the  Messianic  promise  might  fail 
or  at  least  be  postponed.  Thus  the  fortunes  of  Judah 
were  bound  up  in  the  religious  fortunes  of  the  world. 
Hence  the  prophet  goes  to  the  root  of  the  matter  and 
gives  a  sign,  not  only  that  the  confederacy  shall  fail, 
but  that  everything  else  directed  against  the  Kingdom 
of  God  shall  fail.  That  sign  was  Immanuel,  the 
Messiah. 

The  occasion  of  giving  the  sign  was  the  faithless¬ 
ness  of  Ahaz.  Therefore  the  sign  contains  both  a 
blessing  and  a  curse.  These  are  always  the  two 
elements  in  the  Messianic  promise.  The  aged  Simeon 
said  to  the  Virgin  Mary:  “Behold,  this  child  is  set 
for  the  falling  and  rising  of  many  in  Israel;  and  for 
a  sign  which  is  spoken  against”  (Luke  2:34).  For 
Ahaz  the  sign  contained  no  blessing.  It  meant 
reproof  for  his  faithlessness  and  the  failure  of  his 
policy  of  subservience  to  Assyria.  In  so  far  as  this 
policy  was  shared  by  the  royal  house  it  meant  the 
same  thing  for  them,  but  if  anyone  in  the  royal  house 
or  out  of  it  trusted  in  God  and  His  promises,  the 
sign  meant  for  him  incalculable  blessing.  It  included 
in  germ,  not  only  the  deliverance  of  Judah  in  its 
emergency,  but  the  salvation  of  all  mankind  and  that 
for  which  we  daily  pray,  the  coming  of  the  Kingdom 
of  God  in  all  its  fulness.  In  the  light  of  this  fact  it 
is  very  significant  that  the  sign  Immanuel  is  given  in 
the  plural  to  the  whole  house  of  David,  while  the 
history  of  the  child  which  contains  hardship  and  doom 
is  given  in  particular  to  faithless  Ahaz.  Possibly  the 
royal  family  included  one  man  of  faith  who  could 


THE  SIGN  IMMANUEL 


233 


appreciate  the  promise  of  Immanuel.  He  could  appro¬ 
priate  it  as  his  own  for  his  lasting  comfort.  To  Ahaz, 
however,  the  prophet  says:  “Jehovah  will  bring  upon 
thee,  and  upon  thy  people,  and  upon  thy  father’s 
house,  days  that  have  not  come,  from  the  day  that 
Ephraim  departed  from  Judah — even  the  king  of 
Assyria.”  To  Ahaz  Immanuel  was  a  savor  of  death 
unto  death,  but  to  those  who  believed  he  was  a  savor 
of  life  unto  life  (2  Cor.  2:16). 

In  passing  it  is  worth  while  to  remark  that  several 
of  the  most  important  Messianic  promises  were  occa¬ 
sioned  by  the  faithlessness  and  wickedness  of  men. 
The  protevangelium  was  occasioned  by  the  sin  of  our 
first  parents.  It  was  addressed  to  the  serpent  who 
brought  sin  into  the  world  and  all  our  woe,  and  was 
a  part  of  the  curse  upon  him  (Gen.  3:14,  15).  The 
Messianic  promise  to  Noah  was  occasioned  by  the  sin 
of  Ham  (Gen.  9:25-27).  The  promise  of  the  star  out 
of  Jacob  was  occasioned  by  the  desire  of  Edom  and 
Moab  to  curse  Israel  (Num.  24:17,  18).  God  turned 
Balaam’s  curse  into  a  blessing.  Nowhere  else  is  the 
saying  of  the  Psalmist  more  perfectly  exemplified,  that 
the  wrath  of  man  shall  praise  God.  As  it  was  the 
awful  sin  of  Israel  in  rejecting  their  Messiah  which 
brought  to  all  men  the  priceless  blessings  of  Calvary, 
so  it  was  the  sin  of  men  which  gave  to  others  the 
comfort  of  the  promise  of  His  coming.  “He  that 
believeth  on  the  Son  hath  eternal  life;  but  he  that 
believeth  not  the  Son  shall  not  see  life,  but  the  wrath 
of  God  abideth  on  him”  (John  3:36).  Thus  we  do 
not  agree  with  the  ingenious  interpretation  of  F.  C. 
Porter,  who  found  the  sign  of  our  passage  in  the 
contrast  between  the  name  of  Immanuel  and  His 
history.  The  contrast  is  in  reality  not  between 


234 


THE  BIBLICAL  REVIEW 


Immanuel  and  His  history  but  between  those  who 
accept  Immanuel  and  those  who  reject  Him. 

We  now  pass  to  our  third  and  last  inquiry,  the 
fulfilment  of  the  sign.  Here  we  will  find  a  wide 
diversity  of  views.  To  begin  with,  it  is  very  surprising 
that  there  is  no  documentary  evidence  that  the  Jews 
have  ever  interpreted  the  name  Immanuel  as  referring 
to  the  Messiah.  Neither  the  Targum  of  Jonathan  nor 
the  Jerusalem  Targum  gives  any  hint  of  such  an  inter¬ 
pretation,  nor  is  Immanuel  mentioned  in  the  Talmud, 
nor  is  the  name  in  the  list  of  Messianic  names  prepared 
by  Hamburger.  However,  Isaiah  9:6  and  11:1  are 
interpreted  Messianically  in  Jewish  writings  of  ancient 
time,  arousing  the  suspicion  that  such  was  originally 
the  case  with  Isaiah  7:14  also.  Possibly  the  Jews 
abandoned  their  Messianic  interpretation  of  the  pas¬ 
sage  because  of  the  use  the  Christians  made  of  it  in 
confirmation  of  the  Messiahship  of  Jesus.  It  seems 
strange,  indeed,  that  Matthew  should  apply  the  verse 
to  Jesus  in  his  Gospel  for  the  Jews  unless  it  was 
customary  for  them  to  regard  it  as  a  Messianic 
prediction. 

The  principal  fulfilments  of  the  sign  which  are 
sought  are  as  follows: 

(1)  The  usual  rabbinic  interpretation  refers 
Immanuel  to  Hezekiah.  This  has  the  great  advantage 
that  Immanuel  was  evidently  of  the  Davidic  line.  He 
is  addressed  in  Isaiah  8:8  as  the  owner  of  the  land 
implying  that  he  was  the  occupant  of  the  royal  throne. 
Furthermore,  the  child  whose  birth  is  foretold  in  Isaiah 
7:14  was  evidently  the  same  as  the  child  represented  as 
already  born  in  Isaiah  9:6  and  chapter  11 ;  but  in  Isaiah 
9:7  he  is  said  to  sit  upon  the  throne  of  David,  and  in 
Isaiah  11:1  he  is  called  “a  shoot  out  of  the  stock  of 


THE  SIGN  IMMANUEL 


235 


Jesse.”  Moreover,  if  Immanuel  were  Hezekiah,  the 
Messianic  application  is  plain.  Other  things  being 
equal,  it  is  more  in  accord  with  other  Messianic  pre¬ 
dictions  to  refer  Immanuel  to  the  Messiah  through  the 
medium  of  a  type  than  directly.  Yet,  attractive  as 
this  identification  is,  it  is  made  impossible  by  chrono¬ 
logical  facts.  The  reign  of  Ahaz  lasted  sixteen  years 
(2  Kings  16:2;  2  Chron.  28:1).  His  son  Hezekiah 
immediately  succeeded  his  father  and  was  twenty-five 
years  old  at  his  accession  (2  Kings  18:2;  2  Chron. 
29:1).  Hence,  Hezekiah  was  born  nine  years  before 
Ahaz  came  to  the  throne  and  a  still  longer  time  before 
the  prophecy  of  Immanuel. 

(2)  Other  commentators  seek  to  identify 
Immanuel  with  the  second  son  of  Isaiah,  Maher-shalal- 
hash-baz.  The  principal  argument  in  favor  of  this  is 
in  the  fact  that  the  birth  of  that  child  is  told  in  Isaiah  8 
as  though  it  were  a  fulfilment  of  the  prediction  of 
chapter  7.  The  explanation  of  his  name  bears  a 
marked  resemblance  to  that  of  Immanuel.  Before 
Immanuel  “shall  know  to  refuse  the  evil,  and  choose 
the  good,  the  land  whose  two  kings  thou  abhorrest 
shall  be  forsaken”  (Isa.  7:16).  Before  Maher-shalal- 
hash-baz  “shall  have  knowledge  to  cry,  My  father,  and, 
My  mother,  the  riches  of  Damascus  and  the  spoil  of 
Samaria  shall  be  carried  away  before  the  king  of 
Assyria”  (Isa.  8:4).  There  is,  however,  this  important 
difference  between  them.  The  latter  was  a  sign  only 
of  the  fall  of  Damascus  and  Samaria,  while  the  former, 
as  we  have  seen,  has  a  much  larger  significance.  The 
decisive  argument  against  this  interpretation  is  in  the 
fact  that  Maher-shalal-hash-baz  was  not  of  the  royal 
line.  To  accept  it  we  must  separate  the  Immanuel  of 
chapter  7  from  the  child  of  chapters  9  and  11  and 


2361 


THE  BIBLICAL  REVIEW 


violate  the  uniformity  of  exegesis  in  which  the  types 
of  Christ  as  king  are  all  in  the  Davidic  line.  Another 
incidental  objection  is  found  in  the  names  of  the  two 
mothers.  Isaiah  would  scarcely  have  referred  to  his 
own  wife  as  the  maiden,  especially  since  he  calls  her 
the  prophetess  in  Isaiah  8:3. 

(3)  In  1778  a  Roman  Catholic  commentator 
named  Isenbiehl,  and  since  then  others,  favored  the 
idea  that  Immanuel  was  the  child  of  some  mother 
who  was  present  in  the  crowd  before  Isaiah.  Umbreit 
and  others  have  even  suggested  that  the  prophet 
pointed  to  a  woman  in  the  company  who  was  already 
pregnant  and  spoke  the  words  of  this  prophecy.  The 
chief  and  only  argument  which  can  be  used  in  favor 
of  this  very  offensive  interpretation  is  the  article  with 
the  word  rendered  virgin.  The  most  common  usage 
of  the  article  in  Hebrew  is  to  designate  a  person  or 
thing  which  has  been  mentioned  or  is  well  known. 
However,  the  use  of  the  article  can  be  adequately 
explained  without  resorting  to  an  interpretation  which 
would  be  so  indelicate  as  this.  Any  exegesis  which 
represents  the  mother  as  well  known,  whether  present 
or  absent,  would  explain  the  article. 

(4)  A  somewhat  different  interpretation  is 
advanced  by  several  modern  exegetes,  viz.,  that  the 
mother  was  any  Jewish  woman  of  Isaiah’s  time  who 
would  name  her  child,  soon  to  be  born,  Immanuel,  as 
an  expression  of  her  faith  in  the  promise  of  God 
delivered  through  the  prophet.  Parallels  may  be  found 
for  such  a  use  of  the  article;  but  this  interpretation 
separates  the  passage  from  those  in  chapters  9  and  11 
and  confines  the  significance  of  the  sign  to  the  faith 
of  the  unknown  mother,  as  shown  in  the  name  she 
gives  her  child.  The  child  himself  has  no  importance 


I 


THE  SIGN  IMMANUEL  237 

and  of  course  could  not  properly  be  a  type  of  the 
Messiah. 

(5)  Still  another  group  of  interpreters,  of  whom 
Whitehouse  is  the  most  prominent  representative, 
regards  the  mother  as  a  personification  of  the  house 
of  David  or  of  Zion.  They  refer  to  Amos  5:2  and 
Jeremiah  18:13;  31:4,  21,  where  the  expression,  “virgin 
of  Israel,”  is  a  personification  of  the  nation.  The  word 
for  virgin  in  these  passages,  however,  is  not  the  one 
in  Isaiah  7 :14,  but  the  other  word  already  explained. 
F urthermore,  this  exegesis  leaves  the  child  quite 
indefinite,  and  some  make  it  a  general  name  of  the 
next  generation.  It  also  cuts  off  the  prediction  from 
those  in  chapters  9  and  11. 

(6)  Rosenmiiller,  and  more  recently  Gressmann, 

Jeremias,  and  other  very  advanced  scholars  have 

admitted  that  this  verse  (Isa.  7:14)  is  a  prediction  of 

the  virgin  birth  of  the  Messiah,  but  have  attempted  to 

explain  that  expectation  and  its  alleged  fulfilment  by 

comparison  with  similar  virgin  births  in  ancient 

mythology.  They  refer  especially  to  the  fact  that 

S argon  of  Agade  was  represented  as  the  son  of  the 

goddess  Ishtar,  although  there  was  no  male  deity  in 

the  Babylonian  mythology  who  was  the  consort  of 

Ishtar.  Hence  it  is  inferred  that  the  birth  of  Sargon 

was  a  virgin  birth.  It  is  a  sufficient  reply  to  this  to 

draw  attention  to  the  figurative  sense  in  which  Sargon 

was  considered  as  the  son  of  Ishtar,  and  that  Ishtar 

was  a  goddess  and  not  a  woman.  Others  compare  the 

myth  that  the  infant  Zeus  was  fed  on  milk  and  honey 

in  the  cave  on  Mount  Ida,  as  though  only  one  child 

in  human  historv  could  have  eaten  such  food,  and 

%/ 

therefore  Zeus  and  Immanuel  dissolve  into  one.  They 
also  find  an  argument  for  the  mythical  origin  of  our 


238 


THE  BIBLICAL  REVIEW 


passage  in  the  fact  that  the  Virgin  Mary  is  associated 
with  Virgo,  one  of  the  signs  of  the  zodiac,  on  a  side 
door  of  the  cathedral  of  Notre  Dame  in  Paris.  The 
date  of  the  building  of  Notre  Dame  shows  that  this 
association  was  a  medieval  afterthought.  The  cathedral 
was  founded  in  1163  a.d.  on  the  site  of  a  church  of 
the  fourth  century.  The  explanation  of  the  prophecy 
of  the  virgin  birth  of  the  Messiah  and  its  fulfilment, 
as  derived  from  heathen  mythology,  utterly  fails, 
because  no  connection  between  those  myths  and  our 
prediction  can  be  established. 

All  these  interpretations  proving  inadequate,  we 
are  driven  to  the  conclusion  that  we  have  here  a  direct 
and  immediate  prediction  of  the  birth  of  Jesus  Christ. 
The  air  of  mystery  in  the  passage  indicated  by  the 
unusual  name  of  the  mother  and  of  the  child,  an  air 
which  is  reflected  in  the  reference  in  Micah  5:3,  fits 
well  with  this  fulfilment.  Incensed  by  Ahaz’s  faithless¬ 
ness,  the  prophet’s  eye  foresees  the  birth  of  the  Messiah 
as  the  supreme  sign  that  all  he  had  foretold  should  be 
accomplished.  As  was  usual  with  the  prophets,  he  did 
not  distinguish  the  distant  from  the  near  future.  To 
him  Immanuel  seemed  to  grow  up  during  the  Assyrian 
invasion,  just  as,  in  the  predictions  of  the  second 
advent,  that  glorious  event  seems  to  synchronize  with 
the  fall  of  Jerusalem  (Matt.  25). 

The  objection  that  the  birth  of  Christ  could  not 
be  a  sign  to  Ahaz  and  the  people  of  his  time  proceeds 
from  a  misunderstanding  of  prophecy.  The  coming 
of  the  Messiah  had  been  long  foretold,  and  to  the 
viewpoint  of  faith  it  was  as  good  as  accomplished.  It 
was  a  commonplace  of  Isaiah’s  time.  From  the 
promise  of  the  great  Son  of  David  (2  Sam.  7:12-16) 
and  other  Messianic  predictions  the  people  were 


THE  SIGN  IMMANUEL 


239 


familiar  with  the  idea.  The  reference  in  Micah  5:3, 
in  connection  with  the  prediction  of  the  birth  of  the 
Messiah  at  Bethlehem,  shows  that  our  passage  was 
interpreted  as  a  direct  prediction  of  the  Messiah  in 
Isaiah’s  own  day.  This  promise  was  a  sign  to  Ahaz 
and  the  whole  house  of  David.  As  Franz  Delitzsch 
put  it:  “The  Future  One,  although  he  has  not  yet 
appeared  possessed  of  a  body,  leads  an  ideal  life  in 
the  Old  Testament  history.”  The  existence  of  this 
ideal  was  a  proof  to  the  Old  Testament  saints  that 
the  prophecies  would  be  fulfilled.  A  somewhat  anala- 
gous  case  is  found  in  the  promise  of  God  to  Moses, 
at  the  burning  bush:  “This  shall  be  the  token  unto 
thee,  that  I  have  sent  thee:  when  thou  hast  brought 
forth  the  people  out  of  Egypt,  ye  shall  serve  God 
upon  this  mountain”  (Ex.  3:12).  This  sign  to  Moses, 
like  that  to  Ahaz,  was  not  fulfilled  for  a  long  time. 
During  the  period  when  Moses  was  pleading  with 
Pharaoh  to  let  Israel  go,  he  needed  the  confirmation. 
Yet  it  was  not  until  after  the  Exodus,  when  the  people 
encamped  at  Sinai,  that  the  sign  was  fulfilled.  The 
significant  thing  for  us  here  is  that  in  the  long  interval 
the  promise  was  itself  a  sign. 

So  the  promise  of  the  birth  of  Immanuel  was  a 
sign  to  all  who  knew  it  before  He  came;  and  since 
He  has  come,  He  is  the  supreme  sign  of  the  truth 
of  all  that  the  prophets  foretold.  “How  many  soever 
be  the  promises  of  God,  in  him  is  the  yea:  wherefore 
also  through  him  is  the  Amen”  (2  Cor.  1:20).  To  the 
prophetic  view  of  Isaiah  the  birth  of  the  Messiah 
seemed  imminent.  He  could  not  distinguish  the  distant 
from  the  near;  but  he  was  sure  that  before  the  child 
would  reach  years  of  discretion,  the  Assyrian  invasion 
would  bring  misfortune  to  the  land.  How  much  before 


240 


THE  BIBLICAL  REVIEW 


9 

the  maturity  of  the  Messiah  this  invasion  would  occur 
he  could  not  tell. 

To  Ahaz  and  his  contemporaries  the  Messiah  was 
given  as  a  sign  of  events  near  by.  To  us  He  is 
given  as  a  sign  of  all  the  glorious  events  yet  unful¬ 
filled  in  the  history  of  the  Kingdom  of  God. 

New  Brunswick,  New  Jersey. 


